Hair Extensions (For Dummies!)

Joel and I have this one friend, Ben, who is an actual real life genius. He is a neuroscientist with an IQ of, like, 160 (probably). THE ONLY time I have ever seen Ben stumped or in disbelief was when we were all hanging out around the time of our wedding last year and he saw me casually pull out my hair extensions… The “waaaait, whaaaat?!” look on his face led my to believe that if I could fool someone so unfoolable, I must be an expert… yes, an expert at clipping in hair extensions, but an expert nonetheless.

I’ve been wearing hair extensions for a longgggg time because my stupid hair won’t grow all the way down to my butt no matter how hard I will it to do so. Also, I keep cutting it on top of forgetting to take my biotin so there’s that.

Back in high school, I used to buy the hair and sew in the clips myself, but these days, ain’t nobody got time for that. My friend suggested eBay for buying extensions, which is what I did this last spring. I would definitely recommend buying these if you want to give hair extensions a try. They’re inexpensive and good quality and if you need to tweak the color to match your own hair, it’s easily accomplished (my cousin applied a toner to mine and now they blend perfectly).

Here is my tried and true method to hair extensions:

HOW TO

Begin by sectioning off the very bottom two inches of you hair. Clip the rest on top of your head.

Using a teasing brush, back comb your roots (I read in a magazine once that this helps the clips stay in place)

Clip in a two or three clip piece of hair and curl in sections (I like to use my trusty old curling iron, since my curling rod is MIA, to curl the top of the strands first then pull the curling iron down to the bottom instead of trying to wrap all the hair around at once.)

Lightly brush through all of the curls before adding hairspray and/or texturizing spray.

Other Uses For Hair Extensions

Add extensions to a top knot to make it look like an avant-garde birds nest.

Misplaced your Groucho Marx disguise glasses? Use hair extensions to make yourself look like a sexy unibomber and go spy on your neighbors.

Need material to make a rope because you’re camping or on a boat or something? Braid your hair extensions and use those.

Additional Tips

Brush your hair extensions both before and after every use.

Wash your hair extensions semi-regularly (obviously not as much as you wash your own hair, but don’t never wash them).

Definitely unclip and pull out your hair extensions in a public place to see peoples’ reactions.

If you’re wearing hair extensions when you go visit your sister and she asks in that patronizing way of hers if “that’s all yourreal hair?” say “yes”. I mean, it is your hair, you paid for it.

Name your hair extensions. I call mine Sylvia.

Stop calling them hair extensions and refer to them only as your “weave” or by the name you gave them in the last tip.

As someone who will never be able to pull off sexy, short hair, I appreciate the hell out of hair extensions (I mean “my weave”! I MEAN “SYLVIA”!). I plan to keep these luxurious locks for an unbe-weave-ably long time.